I don’t do well with dares. In the fourth grade, I was double-dog dared to stand on a ladder and pee over the hood of my friend’s daddy’s Oldsmobile.

August 27, 2017

DEAR SEAN:

I just can’t read you anymore. At first you were cool, but now you’re a @!#$% dork. There have been tons of national events in the news... And you just ignore them… You're all busy writing about your stupid dog and @#$%.

Sometimes I just want to say, “Nobody cares about your dumb dog!”

I dare you to write me back,AIN’T NOBODY GOT TIME FOR SEAN OF THE SOUTH

DEAR AIN’T NOBODY:

I don’t do well with dares. In the fourth grade, I was double-dog dared to stand on a ladder and pee over the hood of my friend’s daddy’s Oldsmobile.

I didn’t have enough back-pressure in my nine-year-old bladder to clear the hood. My friend’s daddy nearly had a heart attack.

My mama made me peel potatoes until I was thirty.

Anyway, I just read your letter aloud to Ellie Mae. I wish you could've seen her face. She’s crushed. She wears her feelings on her collar, you know.

Today, Ellie Mae woke earlier than normal.

Most often, she rises at the crack of noon. This morning, she woke at 5 A.M. because of a persistent ear infection.

I’ve taken her to the vet six times in the last five months. I took her yesterday.

You’ll be thrilled to know the vet says her ears are getting better. He also says that her problem is just part of having long, floppy, magnificent, voluptuous, comely, silken, ears.

Then, he rubbed her belly and said, “I think Ellie is one of my favorite patients.”

His favorite.

A remark like that deserves celebration. I took Ellie to Pet Smart as a reward. She sniffed a few employee hindparts, then made friends with a Corgie named Jim.

We tour the sleepy community. I see old cotton gins, peanut processing plants, chicken houses, soybeans, cattle, live oaks suffocated in Spanish moss.

August 26, 2017

Goshen, Alabama—I am on a dirt road. Above me is a canopy of shade oaks, stretching to Beulah Land. I am surrounded by thousands of acres of farmland.

With me is Darren.

Darren is mayor of Goshen. He is young, but he has gray in his sideburns. He is a paramedic, a captain for Troy Fire Department, a volunteer firefighter for Pike County, and he cuts grass for a living.

“This is a tiny town,” says Darren. “You gotta do lotta jobs to make ends meet.”

Town Hall sits off the highway. It’s a brick building—small as a Waffle House. The place doubles as a senior center and cafeteria.

“Lotta our residents are old,” says Darren. “It’s important for us to take care of our own.”

I meet one such elder. Mister Jimmy—a man with hair like snow and a voice like ribbon cane syrup. He shows me black-and-white photos from Goshen’s glory days. He tells stories.

“Did Darren tell you about Goshen’s claim to fame?”

No sir, not

yet.

They show me a ledger book with yellowed pages and loose binding. It contains jail records, dating to the nineteen-hundreds. If anyone ever spent a night in Goshen’s one-room drunk tank, it’s written here.

“I taught writing, you know,” she says. “I was a middle-school teacher in East Brewton, nearly all my life. I taught’em, graded’em, and sent’em up.” Miss Jacque had students from all walks of life. The well-off. The not-so-well off. And those living in poverty.

August 23, 2017

Brewton, Alabama—Camp 31 Barbecue. A place with pine on the floors, pine on the walls, pork on the plates.

It’s Tuesday, lunchtime. I’m sitting with Miss Jacque. She is a slight, older woman. She has bright blue eyes, and when she opens her mouth, South Alabama comes out.

“You’re a writer, huh?” she says.

“I’ve been called worse, ma’am.”

“I taught writing, you know,” she says. “I was a middle-school teacher in East Brewton, nearly all my life. I taught’em, graded’em, and sent’em up.”

Miss Jacque had students from all walks of life. The well-off. The not-so-well off. And those living in poverty.

She has stories about underprivileged students that would make a grown man leak saltwater.

We are interrupted by our waitress.

Our server asks if we need refills on iced tea. Miss Jacque nods. The girl fills our glasses and leaves the pitcher on the table. She gives Miss Jacque a hug.

Miss Jacque’s face loses four decades.

When the waitress walks away, Miss Jacque remarks:

“She used’a be in my class, long time ago. She was a rowdy one, but I sure love her.”

Miss Jacque seems to have a lot of love. In fact, she would’ve taught school forever if she could have. But time caught up with her.

Every cowgirl has to hang up her lasso eventually.

The day after her farewell party, she realized retiring was harder than she thought.

“I was slap miserable. It was horrible. I got so dadgum bored I about died. I’m too old to be bored.”

Too old. Though I do not learn how old she is, exactly. Miss Jacque is a sophisticated belle. And the time-honored rule is: any Alabamian woman who does not disclose her…

T-minus one minute until eclipse time. And here I am, writing you. Ellie Mae and I are about to step outside and view the magnificent event through twenty-dollar NASA-approved plastic glasses. The moon will block the sun—it will be horrifying and pretty at the same time.

“Dear Sean, I’m at a Georgia rest stop, typing on my phone… I just had to tell someone that I finally DID IT!”

She did it.

She left the man who’s been abusing her for thirteen years. He broke her cheekbone once. He busted her neck a few months ago.

“For a long time, I kept saying, ‘He’s not a bad guy,’ And I defended him... Yeah, I know, I’m the dumbass stereotypical victim, right?”

Wrong. She’s no stereotype. She’s a graduate from the University of Alabama, a nice-looking girl, and one tough biscuit.

And now she’s free.

She made the drive to South Carolina to watch the eclipse with her sister.

Meet Jaden—he writes to say that he just got married to Yasmine.

Jaden is twenty-one. So is Yasmine. They wanted to go somewhere special for their honeymoon. They scheduled time off work, reserved a hotel room, saved money. Two days

ago, their car broke down.

“My wife and me both don’t have parents,” says Jaden. “That’s part of why we understand each other. My dad’s dead and my mom’s in jail. Yasmine never met her real parents...

“This was supposed to be our for-real honeymoon, during the eclipse, but now we’re making it a stay-cation. We’re a little disappointed… But I want her to know that I’m so blessed and grateful and I really love her, can you give Yasmine a shout out?”

Yes.

Then there's Charles:

“Hey Sean, just want to invite you to my eclipse party if you’re near Little Rock, Arkansas, it’s going to be awesome!”

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Sean Dietrich

Sean Dietrich is a columnist, and novelist, known for his commentary on life in the American South. His work has appeared in Southern Living, The Tallahassee Democrat, Good Grit, South Magazine, Alabama Living, the Birmingham News, Thom Magazine, The Mobile Press Register, and he has authored seven books.